Thread by @Angry_Voice

Much has been made of Labour's Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves saying that she won't consider nationalisation of energy companies as an option, even as the privatised energy industry collapses into chaos around us.

1/

A clear majority of the UK public favour energy renationalisation (and public ownership of most other strategically crucial infrastructure and services too), so by ruling it out Rachel Reeves is defying the public will.

2/

The UK should run its own energy infrastructure for the benefit of the British people, rather than allowing it to be operated as wealth-extraction by a shambolic mix of corporate profiteers & foreign governments, so by ruling out renationalisation she's defying common sense.

3/

Labour Conference just voted strongly in favour of energy renationalisation, so by ruling it out Reeves is outright defying democracy.

bbc.com/news/uk-politi…

4/

And Keir Starmer promised energy renationalisation multiple times during his leadership bid (in his 5th pledge, and during hustings too), so by ruling it out Reeves is blatantly proving her own party leader a liar.

5/

Given the choice, Reeves has sided with capital against the British people, incurring all of the reputation costs to the Labour Party that such a tin-eared, illogical, and partisan decision entails.

6/

But perhaps the most telling thing about Reeves' positioning is her use of the word "ideological" to deride people who say that the in the midst of this crisis in the privatised energy sector, renationalisation should at least be considered as an option.

7/

According to the worldview of people like Rachel Reeves, it's "ideological" to say that all options should be considered, and non-ideological to rule out certain options in favour of rigidly maintaining the status quo!

8/

Most people who stop to think about it for a moment, would realise that it's actually ideological to advocate for any position, whether it's a change in policy, or maintenance of the established order of things.

9/

But people who buy into the established orthodoxy don't see the current orthodoxy as being based on any kind of ideology, nor themselves as ideological for refusing to think outside the limited spectrum of debate that their favoured ideology allows.

10/

But as far as orthodox thinkers like Reeves are concerned, the way things are, is the natural way that things are supposed to be, and anyone who dares suggest alternatives is guilty of the crime of being "ideological".

11/

It's quite something to see the most ideologically rigid of thinkers like Rachel Reeves deriding those who would at least consider alternative ideas as being "ideological", as if believing in something different, or even being open minded, is an inherently bad thing.

12/

But rigidly orthodox thinkers like this can't help it because they're so heavily invested in their own ideology that it's become absolutely unquestionable to them.

13/

To narrow-minded orthodox thinkers like Reeves, questioning whether profiteering corporations and foreign states should be allowed to use vital UK infrastructure for their own profit extraction schemes, is akin to questioning whether grass is green or the water is wet.

14/

To them, it's just the way it is, and always should be, so anyone doubting private profiteering in the UK energy sector must have been driven absolutely mad by "ideology" to even dare question what her ideology has defined as absolutely unquestionable.

15/

And it's quite something to witness one of these rigidly ideological thinkers publicly deriding the more open-minded among us as being infected with "ideology".

16/16